MaineToday.com | 10 reasons to raise chickens: 10 reasons to raise chickens

May 25, 2007

10 reasons to raise chickens

10. They help you build upper-body strength by hauling their feed bags

9. They keep family activities interesting with their curiosity (but it's doubtful our chickens will get near diet coke again)

8. They help dispell myths about their abilities - like the fact that they really can fly

7. They give you eggs to eat, which can be more than you can handle sometimes

6. They eat any kind of left-overs, including gingerbread houses and ice cream cake

5. They are easy pets to take care of (my daughter takes exception to that in the winter when their water freezes)

4. You can play doctor on them and they don't really mind

3. They are pretty good actors with a little coaching (the next installment of the "Magical Leaf" will likely be out this summer)

2. They pick through the compost pile, which helps aerate and speed up the decomposing process

1. They love to eat ticks! - which are in abundance this year

Posted by Wendy Almeida at 10:11 AM

Comments

Have you tried feeding them leftover cooked spagetti? That was a favorite for our kids to feed the chickens. When the first fowl hit the spagetti pile, grabbed a strand and ran off to eat it, all of a sudden the pile was no longer interesting to the rest of the flock! They did not want the "dead" ones on the ground, but rather the "live" (and wiggling!) one in the first chicken's beak! 'Round and round the poultry yard the flock ran, until one of the "tail end charlies" bringing up the rear of the pack gave up in disgust and decided to settle for a "dead" one. Which of course became "live" the moment she picked it up and all of a sudden she found herself "it" in the spagetti game. They never failed to give us an interesting evening.

I can also report that sea gulls do NOT exhibit this behavior!

Posted by Starwalker
May 26, 2007 11:02 AM